Psychic Reality and the Limitations of Classical Theory

24th Karl Abraham Lecture

While many of Freud’s formulations were restricted by the epistemological assumptions of his times, his creative genius allowed him to anticipate post-modern views that are at the cutting edge of contemporary analytic thinking. This talk will attempt to examine the epistemological basis – what do we think we know and how do we think we come to know it? - for the shift in the aims of analysis from a predominant emphasis on uncovering mental contents to one that also includes the creation of mental contents and the strengthening of the instruments for thinking and the capacity for thought. A brief clinical example will illustrate some of the clinical implications of this shift.

Howard B. Levine, is a member of the Contemporary Freudian Society and the Psychoanalytic Institute of New England, East (PINE), a former member of the Board of Directors of the IPA, on the editorial Board of the IJP and Psychoanalytic Inquiry and in private practice in Brookline, Massachusetts, He has authored many articles, book chapters, and reviews on psychoanalytic process and technique, intersubjectivity, the treatment of primitive personality disorders, and the consequences and treatment of early trauma and childhood sexual abuse. He edited Adult Analysis and Childhood Sexual Abuse (Analytic Press 1990), co-edited (with Lawrence Brown) of Growth and Turbulence in the Container/Contained (Routledge, 2013), (with Gail Reed and Dominique Scarfone) of Unrepresented States and the Construction of Meaning (Karnac 2013,) (with Gail Reed) Responses to Freud’s Screen Memories Paper (Karnac 2014), (with Giuseppe Civitarese) The Wilfred Bion Tradition (Karnac 2015), and (with Jose Junqueira de Mattos and Gisele Brito) Bion in Brazil. (Karnac forthcoming).

The Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute (Karl Abraham Institute) represents classical psychoanalysis and is a member of the International Psychoanalytic Association (IPA). One emphasis of its activities is the exchange with international professional societies and their members. The Karl Abraham Lecture takes place every year in May to commemorate the birthday of Karl Abraham, after whom the institute has been named. Internationally renowned psychoanalysts and scholars are invited to give the lecture.